Cover art from the album: You Can Tune a Piano But You Can't Tuna Fish by REO Speedwagon

Back in January, I made a musical tin for my friend Lisa, who is not only an awesome DBA (database administrator) but a musician too. If you did not read the blog post, I have to tell you the following so you are up to speed on this next part. I made the tin so it could hold her guitar auto-tuner and then we found it that the tin was a bit too small and so it would turn on and drain the battery in the tuner. I knew I had to make a new tin for her and her tuner.

Then, in April, I then "borrowed it" so it could be photographed for an article that will appear in the November issue of Art Jewelry magazine and they have had it since then.

Since Lisa's birthday is this weekend, I decided to make her that new tin and do my entry for the Facebook Chasing & Repousse group challenge #4 - FISH at the same time.

I decided that I would do a pun based upon the REO Speedwagon album "You Can Tune a Piano, but You Can't Tuna Fish" and put a Blue Fin TUNA on the tin and this time I would dome the lid of the Altoid tin so the TUNER not TUNA would fit inside.

Two weekends ago, I started. I removed the paint from the lid and domed it. I then located some line art of a Blue Fin Tuna and scaled it to fit on the lid. Then I put the lid in the pitch bowl and lined it. After the lining, I flipped the lid in the pitch bowl so I could to the repousse and form the fish.

This past Friday, I did the repousse and then flipped the lid again and put it back into the pitch bowl so I could to the final chasing and detail work. On Saturday I finished the chasing, pulled the lid from the pitch and cleaned the extra pitch from the inside and outside of the lid. Sunday I was able to apply the solvent dye patina to create a sea blue background and get the coloring on the Tuna correct.

While all of this was going on, I was posting images of the tin lid to Facebook and tagging Lisa with the comments about ....Tuna Fish.

We then made arrangements to go to dinner, for her birthday, yesterday after work. We of course went for Sushi (get the fishie theme going on here?). At Lisa's I showed her the tin and she just loved it - and she still did not know it was her present. I asked her to get her TUNER, not a fish, so we could see if it fit without turning it on; and it did!!! That is when I told her that she now had a TUNA fish for her tuner - and the evil deed was done. Lisa then got the pun and her present all at the same time.

and oh, by the way the musical tin was waiting for me when I got home YESTERDAY.

Yesterday, I found in my messages area of Facebook, a message from a young woman. She lives in Cornwall and is at the university there studying Silversmithing and Jewellery. She was asking me to fill out a questionnaire for one of her classes. My response was OF COURSE I WOULD.

I did think it was cool that she was asking me. I don't know who else was asked but hey, if someone from the other side of the pond wants to ask me questions about I started, who am I to argue. Plus I find it interesting that part of a class has the students asking other silversmiths or any artist some questions to how others got started.

I won't share my responses, I think you can figure them out yourself - especially if your read this blog. But I thought you would like to see the questions asked.

FdA Silversmithing and Jewellery - Work based Learning module.Questions for the Craftsman Education

How do you start? what was your education?

How did your education fit you for a career in the industry?

What was missing?

Do you still do any courses?

Starting up

How did you start?

What kind of finance did you have?

Did you receive any help? (grants etc)

Working Practice

What kind of workshop do you have?

What specialist equipment do you use?

Do you recommend a certain piece of equipment?

What does your typical working day involve?

Their work

What (if any) special techniques do you employ?

Do you subcontract out any technical work? (casting, stone setting, plating)

How do you catalogue your work?

How do you photograph your work?

What kind of personal advertising do you have?(leaflets, post cards, web presence)

Today I finished Sea Urchin III which is the second small one I have done and the third overall. I have one more to make and that one will be a large one like the Sea Urchin II

What I enjoyed while making this one was the confidence I had - the raising of the bowl, the repousse, and the chasing and raising the edge under. It still took careful planning and time but it just was easier to accomplish. I am going to deliver it Wednesday and next weekend I will start the fourth one.

Late last week a friend shared a picture of a geeky cuff - it was silver (or it appeared to be) Pi to many digits. I figured it was my style (being an engineer does help) and decided that I would make one.

After looking at the original image, I think it was computer generated because the numbers are flat looking or they are just printed on the metal.

I decided I would etch my numbers into the silver so they don't wear off. I also wanted the number of digits per line to increase and to do that I had to to have the font size get smaller. I went even further such that the font size went to 1 for the last digit.

First I had to get Pi to many digits so I could fill up the cuff.

Then I went looking for a monspaced font that had serif's to add character (get it??!!) to each digit.

I then took my cuff template, in Illustrator, and pasted in the 100+ digits of Pi I had copied.

I had to bring up the character viewer so the symbol π would be the first character in my list, it turns out π is Opt-P on a MacintoshThen I counted out the number of digits for each line and added carriage returns.

Then you start adjusting the font size.. so you end with 1 and starts with a really, really big size, so it looks balanced, centered, and not strange to the eye.

After making the art work it was time to invert it and mirror image it so my resist would allow it to be etched properly.

And then.... it was apply the resist to my silver, etch it, clean off the resist, shape the cuff, patina, bend and WEAR IT.

Below are some process pictures, of course, but it has me thinking about other things I could do...